by Ian Fox
The woman’s troubled voice interrupted him. “What happened to Carlo?”
“His condition’s very serious. He’s waiting for surgery.”
“Where are you?”
“Central Hospital.”
“I’ll be right there.” The line went dead.
Chapter 13
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The impressive two-story house was wreathed in thick fog. Special agents Sandra Grant and Steven West parked their car on the pavement and hurried toward the grand entrance, which was guarded by two young police officers. Showing their police ID they asked where the crime scene was. One of them pointed to the upper floor.
Upstairs was packed. Three police officers were dusting the surfaces in the hope of finding fingerprints. A female officer was taking a large number of photographs. Two others, wearing surgical gloves, were rummaging around looking for evidence that might be used against any possible suspect. Sitting on a wide leather chair, a tearful young woman with creased clothing covered her face with her hands.
Sandra took a quick look around the room and then approached the girl. “What happened to you?”
The girl shook her head. Her eyes were stained from mascara. She had gained consciousness, only to find the man with whom she’d had intercourse dead on the floor. Horrified, she then thought about how the murderers had been right behind her and she started screaming hysterically, calming down only when the police arrived.
“Tell me what happened.”
Again she shook her head. She wanted to say something but her tongue would not obey her. In shock and afraid of the possible consequences, she was trying to figure out what to say. “You have to promise me not to tell my parents anything. They mustn’t know this happened.”
Sandra Grant put her hand on the girl’s arm. “I can’t promise that, but I can say that we will try not to expose your name.” Her face became serious. “I must warn you that you’re a witness to the murder that took place in this house. You will most certainly be called to testify.”
The young woman hid her face in her hands again. She had gotten herself into a terrible mess and it made her stomach churn. She was thinking what she should do. She had become involved in prostitution to get back at her father, who had cut back her monthly allowance. Ever since she was little her father had bought her everything she wanted, but over the past year he had been punishing her for failing to pass even one of her exams. She had managed to get through her reduced allowance in fewer than ten days, buying the usual expensive clothes and cosmetics. For the rest of the month she was left with only enough for cigarettes, so she’d almost starved. The anger boiling up inside her stopped her calling home.
She had got in touch with her first client over the Internet. She had scrubbed herself under a hot shower straight after the event to get rid of the unpleasant male smell. Then she went to the mall and bought herself a new dress and shoes. She spent the evening crying and saying to herself that it was her dad’s fault.
Before long she returned to the same website to raise more money, never thinking it could get her in trouble. She decided to tell the police only half the truth.
“What kind of relationship did you have with the deceased?”
The words were hard to get off her tongue. “We met in some bar in town …”
Sandra jumped in, saying, “Do you remember the name of the bar?”
The young woman’s creased forehead showed she was thinking. “The Cat’s Tail,” she said, blurting out the name of a bar she had seen somewhere downtown.
“You claim to have met him only today. Can you tell me the victim’s name?”
However hard she tried she couldn’t remember his name, so she again had to make something up. “He introduced himself as Leon.”
Sandra was writing down the answers on a small pad. “And what happened then?”
“This has never happened to me before, but I liked Leon right away. I’ve always been attracted to older men.”
And grossly overweight ones, Sandra thought. She had seen the man who had been shot, lying in the corridor. It was clear to her that the girl was not telling the truth. She was probably a prostitute, but she could not ask the question yet. She decided to ask at the end, after the girl had told her story.
“… We went to his place. As I said before, I have never gone to bed with someone on the first night.” She wiped away the tears swelling up in her eyes.
Sandra offered her a tissue. “Please go on.”
“I can’t tell you much. I was in bed with him when he suddenly froze. I felt something was wrong, so I opened my eyes. I saw him staring at someone behind me.” She stopped, reliving that terrifying moment. “He said, ‘Please, nooo!’ I don’t remember anything after that. I’m sorry.”
“Are you sure there’s nothing else you can remember?”
The girl put her hand to the large bump on her head. “Sorry.”
“OK, this is the last question. Please answer yes or no.”
The girl waited.
“Are you by any chance involved in prostitution? I promise you won’t be prosecuted.”
The girl’s pale cheeks lit up in a moment. “How could you even think that?” she said indignantly.
The agent replied sternly, “I told you to answer yes or no.”
“Of course not,” the girl said in a defensive tone, and sulkily turned away, adding, “I want to go home.”
“We won’t detain you any longer,” Sandra told her, “but first you must be examined by a doctor. Wait here for him.”
Sandra went into the next room, where three men in white overalls were lifting the heavy body onto a stretcher.
Steven followed her. “Male, thirty-four, name of Patrick Gowan,” he said as soon as she threw him a questioning look. “We have quite a bit of information on him. He started thieving when he was still a child, and his parents washed their hands of him. He was in a correctional center most of the time and went to jail when he was twenty for trying to break into a small clothing factory. Then he was probably involved in drug dealing. After that, we don’t have anything on him. Once he was arrested in the company of Brad Hont, who is now in prison for selling drugs.”
The agents dug out their gloves and put them on. Steven pulled a clear plastic wallet out of a dark-blue bag lying on the table and showed her two cigarette ends. “Cigarette butts again.”
Sandra took hold of the bag and had a thorough look at the dirty cigarette filters. “You’re right. They are covered in saliva, like the two we found a couple weeks ago. We could be looking at the same murderer. Who could be that stupid?”
“Obviously someone who isn’t scared of anyone. I don’t think this case will be at all easy. I’d gladly leave it to someone else. You know, it’s never good playing around with the Mafia.”
Sandra bristled. Steven West was an extremely intelligent special agent. He successfully solved most of the cases that came his way, but he instinctively leaned toward easier tasks. He most liked dealing with theft and most hated the murders with Mafia involvement.
“Let someone else solve them,” he said indifferently. “My salary isn’t worth risking my life. I’m not stupid.”
In fact, something completely the opposite of what he said had happened. Sandra had gotten into dangerous situations with criminals twice. Without thinking, Steven had risked his life in order to save her. She was most thankful for what he had done, but then for the next six months had to listen to him grumbling about how he had put his life on the line for her.
She gave him a piercing look. “We’re going to solve this case, just us. It’ll be easy. All we have to do is ask around for who smokes these cigarettes. Then we’ll take a sample of saliva and that’ll be that.”
Deep in thought, Steven stared at the remnants of blood on the carpet. “What a weird pattern. It reminds me of a swan.” He turned to Sandra. “I’m going to gain enemies because of you. These Mafia guys never forget. Revenge comes sooner or later.
Why don’t we leave this case to Gibson?”
Gibson was their colleague who, being very ambitious, was always after the difficult cases.
“No way. We are going to deal with it. Otherwise the whole force will think we’re cowards.”
He scratched his head and pulled a face. “Well, I am scared. I can tell you that and anyone else. Have you forgotten about our old colleague, Bullock?" He paused for a moment. “Have you forgotten the state his corpse was in? They found thirty bullets in his body. His face was unrecognizable. And his hand was cut off. That was a clear enough message for me.”
“I won’t argue with you. We’ll solve this case together, full stop. I’m not going to humiliate myself in front of Ross while you make up excuses that we’re too busy to deal with it.”
He tapped his forehead a few times with his index finger. “I’m going to get my head blown off one day because of you, I hope you realize that. Luckily I don’t have any children.” He looked at her reproachfully. “Actually I’m all alone anyway, so it doesn’t matter what happens to me.” He hung his head sadly.
Sandra didn’t know what to say. A short while earlier she had been so angry with him but now, staring into his boyish face, she felt she would like to stroke his short-trimmed hair and hold him close. She cared about him.
But instead she said in a strict voice, “Stop it, Steve. You’re feeling sorry for yourself again.” She was scared that she’d soften him even more with kindness. That wouldn’t do for a special agent. “Let’s get to work.”
He nodded and followed her into the next room.
Chapter 14
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Simon stared absently at the picture on his office wall, thinking through what Helen had said not long ago. He couldn’t understand why she had changed so much lately. She used to be fun and relaxed, but nowadays she complained and grumbled about every little thing. She seemed to be prepared to argue to death because of a vacation. No, I won’t give in. If there isn’t the money, we simply can’t afford such expensive getaways.
He slowly lifted his left arm to check his watch: it was a little after eight in the morning. Having finished his nightshift, he sleepily dragged himself out into the corridor and walked toward the operating room.
After scrubbing his hands and, with the nurse’s help, putting on his operating gown and surgical gloves, he entered the room and greeted the team. He sat down on a chair next to the patient, who was lying on his back.
“We’re operating on a trapped vein in the wrist,” Dr. Patterson said. “May I make the first incision?”
All eyes turned to Anita, who nodded calmly. “Yes, yes, the patient is already well under. We were expecting you five minutes ago.”
He started to work without commenting on her critical remark. He knew very well that she was angry because he had rejected her. She’ll get over it.
When he made the incision he thought the patient was bleeding too much and wanted to ask Dr. Carter if his blood pressure was OK, but he changed his mind. Not wanting to have anything to do with her, he grimly carried on, knowing he would have to make a bigger effort with the coagulation clamp to stop the bleeding.
Most of the operation passed calmly enough. No one spoke. Dr. Patterson operated while Dr. Jerry Duncan washed the wound and aspirated the remaining blood. The operating room nurse took care of the different instruments while Dr. Anita Carter and Dr. Leon Whitman took care of the anesthesia.
From time to time another nurse, Esther Green, wiped the sweat from Dr. Patterson’s forehead.
After sewing up the wound, he took a deep breath and asked Dr. Duncan to disinfect it with iodine. He left the operating room without a word. He collapsed onto the chair in his office, leaned on his arm, and dozed off from fatigue.
Half an hour later, when he was fast asleep, Anita Carter barged in, saying, “What do you think you’re doing? We’ve been paging you for five minutes!”
He blinked a few times and shook his head. “Wh-what? What happened? Obviously I was so tired I didn’t hear the beeping.”
“What happened? The patient you operated on half an hour ago has broken out in a rash and his throat is so swollen he can hardly breathe. Right now Jerry Duncan is fighting to save his life.”
He was up in a moment and rushed out of his office. If he had turned around he would have seen her glassy eyes with a hint of a smile in them. She was pleased. Everything had gone as she had planned. She had deliberately accused him before the operation of being late, so that he wouldn’t ask her any questions. Anita knew that the patient was allergic to iodine and had deliberately written it illegibly on the patient record card. With that, her task was complete. As the head surgeon, Dr. Patterson was responsible for the whole operation and it was his duty to check the record card or ask about the patient. If he had asked her she would have had to answer, but since he hadn’t ….
The man was in a worse condition than Dr. Patterson had expected. His eyes were bulging like a frog’s and his neck was becoming wider than his head. His body was covered in a red-and-purple rash. He was hardly breathing, obviously struggling for his life.
“Let me through!” he ordered Jerry Duncan, who was doing his utmost to save the patient. “How did it come to this?”
“The patient is allergic to iodine. We shouldn’t have disinfected the wound with iodine.”
Simon Patterson was quick to react.
It took them more than an hour to pull the patient out of serious danger. When Simon returned to his office he was drenched in sweat. Dead tired, he collapsed onto a chair, asking himself how this could happen. He had never let a patient come so near to death out of carelessness.
Chapter 15
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John Melton lived two houses away from Dr. Patterson. He was in his forties, thin, with an angular face and a Roman nose. Standing in front of one of his rosebushes, he was examining the flowers. He couldn’t understand why some of the leaves were turning yellowish brown and falling off. The flowers were smaller than those in the Pattersons’ garden, and black spots were appearing on them. He asked himself what he was doing wrong. He had read many books about gardening and spent at least two hours in the garden every day tending them. Yet John wondered with envy what Simon Patterson was doing to make his roses thrive so much.
Some days John Melton pretended to be resting in the garden, but he was actually watching Simon pruning. John was sure it all depended on the length to which the stems were cut. Unfortunately, he couldn’t see such detail with his naked eye. He solved this problem by buying a new telescope and putting it in his room. Then, every day he waited for Simon to come home from work and hoped he’d go into the garden. He carefully watched the doctor’s hands as he pruned and how he held each stem individually before cutting it. Finally, everything was clear to him. He ran into the garden and started pruning.
He had to wait for months for the roses to start flowering. To his dismay, they were the same as the previous year, while Simon’s were even more beautiful. He only just stopped himself from digging them out of the ground. The more he watched his neighbor, the more hatred and rage were visible on his face. He decided to go into his house.
“I thought you were never coming,” said Maria, his wife. “You know, Simon and Helen will be here any minute now.”
John Melton gestured in an irritated manner. “Need to pop to the bathroom.”
His wife watched him go, thinking how much he had changed over the last five years. He keeps moaning and complaining. He acts as if he’s at least sixty. Because he’s not eating he’s lost a few pounds again. If he goes on like this, he’ll wither away.
Maria Melton had turned forty this year and was slightly plump, with gentle, warm eyes, and she knew how to listen. She had taught geography in school for more than ten years. Her husband John also taught, but he came from a different field. He taught economics to fifteen- to eighteen-year-olds. He kept on complaining about them, that they were trying
to get a rise out of him, and claimed that his job could not be compared to hers. He said that young children were more obedient than older ones, who were not scared of anyone. Maria had to listen to how hard his job was over and over again, every day. “Try listening to them,” she’d say to him, “they aren’t that bad.” But he never took her words in. He was confident that he was a good teacher and the problem lay in the students, who were not interested in gaining knowledge. “That’s all there is to it,” he would say.
The doorbell rang. Maria was glad that Simon and Helen had finally arrived. With a smile on her lips she checked if everything was OK in the oven. The roast goose was slowly turning. Beneath it sizzled golden potatoes mixed with carrots and broccoli. What a feast, she said to herself. She ran to open the door.
“Hi,” Simon and Helen said together.
“Hi,” Maria said, with a genuine smile. “Come in, please.” She showed them toward the dining room.
Simon gave her a lovely bunch of roses from the garden.
“Oh, Simon, you shouldn’t have. They are beautiful.” She removed the white paper and put them into a large Chinese vase, which she filled with water. “Please sit down. Dinner’s ready.”
The room was permeated by the aroma of roast goose. “I can’t wait,” said Simon. “I’m starving.”
Helen shot him an angry glance. “Don’t say that. I did offer you a sandwich when you got home from work. They’ll think I don’t feed you.”
“Sorry, darling, I didn’t mean it like that. I deliberately didn’t eat, knowing Maria would have prepared a feast. Am I right?”
Maria blushed slightly. Simon was the only one who praised her cooking. Helen usually said nothing and her husband John never praised anything anyway.
She replied warmly, “You’re right. I’ve prepared roast goose with potatoes and vegetables.”
Helen looked around the room. “Didn’t you say you were going to buy a new kitchen?”
